''Duquesne'' was a
74-gun
The "seventy-four" was a type of two- decked sailing ship of the line, which nominally carried 74 guns. It was developed by the French navy in the 1740s, replacing earlier classes of 60- and 62-gun ships, as a larger complement to the recently de ...
ship of the line
A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactics in the Age of Sail, naval tactic known as the line of battl ...
of the
French Navy
The French Navy (, , ), informally (, ), is the Navy, maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the four military service branches of History of France, France. It is among the largest and most powerful List of navies, naval forces i ...
. She was captured by the British in 1803, and broken up in 1805.
French service
In 1793, under Captain
Vence
Vence (; ) is a commune set in the hills of the Alpes-Maritimes department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in Southeastern France, north of Nice and Antibes on the Mediterranean coast.
Ecclesiastical history
The first known Bishop ...
, she escorted an important convoy to the
Levant
The Levant ( ) is the subregion that borders the Eastern Mediterranean, Eastern Mediterranean sea to the west, and forms the core of West Asia and the political term, Middle East, ''Middle East''. In its narrowest sense, which is in use toda ...
, and then escaped a watching Anglo-Spanish squadron.
In 1795, under Captain
Allemand, she took part in the
Battle of Cape Noli, and in the
Battle of Hyères Islands
A battle is an occurrence of combat in warfare between opposing military units of any number or size. A war usually consists of multiple battles. In general, a battle is a military engagement that is well defined in duration, area, and force c ...
.
From mid-1801, she was armed
en flûte
''En flûte'' (French: "as a fluyt") is a French naval expression of the Age of Sail to designate the use of a warship as a transport with reduced armament.Willaumez, p. 294
Some warships, ships of the line or frigates, were occasionally used wi ...
and used as a troop ship. On 22 November 1802, she departed Toulon, bound to Saint-Domingue under Commodore
Quérangal,
along with
''Guerrière'' and
''Duguay-Trouin''.
The flotilla found itself caught in the
Blockade of Saint-Domingue
The blockade of Saint-Domingue was a naval campaign fought during the first months of the Napoleonic Wars in which a series of British Royal Navy squadrons blockaded the French-held ports of Cap-Français and Môle-Saint-Nicolas on the norther ...
by the British ships , , , , and . ''Guerrière'' and ''Duguay-Trouin'' managed to escape, and ''Duquesne'', separated from the squadron, attempted to flee in the night. She was discovered by ''Tartar'' and ''Vanguard'' the next afternoon, and after a short artillery duel, ''Duquesne'', outnumbered by her opponents, struck her colours.
Fate
''Duquesne'' was incorporated in the Royal Navy as HMS ''Duquesne''. In 1804, she ran aground on the
Morant Cays
The Morant Cays is an offshore island group 51 km SSE off Morant Point, Jamaica. It is one of two offshore island groups belonging to Jamaica, the other one is the Pedro Cays.
History
In 1780, , under the command of Cuthbert Collingwood was ...
. She was refloated in 1805, and sailed to England to be broken up.
See also
*
List of ships of the line of France
This is a list of French ships of the line of the period 1621–1870 (plus some from the period before 1621). Battlefleet units in the French Navy (''Marine Royale'' before the French Revolution established a republic) were categorised as ''vais ...
Citations
References
*
External links
*
Ships of the line of the French Navy
Téméraire-class ships of the line
1788 ships
{{France-mil-ship-stub